As mentioned on the welcome page, ‘Hawthorn’ is home to Giles Byford and Jill Parkinson. Our lifestyle is an unusual one: we simply potter about the Irish waterways going from job to job. We only work from our boat, which means we may be a while getting to an order, but with the advantage of completeing all work in one visit.
Our commitment to living on the water extends to our free time, with Giles photographing, surveying, and making charts of the waterways (usually with a fishing rod to hand) while Jill pursues her love of art by drawing and painting. There’s a link to a gallery of some of her work above.
Giles has also written extensively about our time on the waterways, most noticeably with the publication of ‘Reedbound’. Illustrated with over 90 of Jill’s drawings it has been critically well received. There’s a link to more information about it above.